1. Field of the Invention
The present invention concerns a method for integration of vectorial and/or tensorial measurement data into a representation on a screen of an anatomical image exposure acquired with an imaging medical examination apparatus.
2. Description of the Prior Art
With medical measurement techniques, for example magnetic resonance tomography, it is possible to determine different spatially-resolved characteristics of an examination subject, such as, for example, tissue characteristics. External influences such as a contrast agent administration or applied mechanical oscillations can additionally be used for this purpose in order, for example, to determine tissue elasticity or reflexivity.
To represent such measurement values in connection with the associated anatomical structures, it has previously been typical to generate an anatomical representation in grey values, on which anatomical representation a color-coded parameter image is then superimposed. Examples of such a representation are the false-color representation of active areas in the human cortex that is superimposed on an anatomical brain image, or red- and blue-color-coded flow images for differentiation of venous and arterial blood that are superimposed on a vessel representation. Representations known as perfusion maps from stroke diagnostics (supported by magnetic resonance apparatuses) are similarly superimposed on diffusion-weighted representations of the brain.
To make such a representation possible, it is necessary for the measurement value to be represented is a scalar, so that it can be associated with a color value. In cases in which the additional measurement value that transcends the purely anatomical data is multi-dimensional, it is necessary to resort to auxiliary constructions such as a representation of vector arrows or the like, but inevitably only a part of the actual present information can be reproduced. The conventionally-used vector arrows thus are shown only for a few selected points of the anatomical representation, such that ultimately a large part (the majority) of the actual measurement information is lost in the representation.